UCSB righthander Jackson Flora added another gem to his historic junior season in Thursday’s series opener, twirling a complete-game shutout to power his team to a 1-0 win over UC Riverside at Caesar Uyesaka Stadium.
Flora, who is set to be the first pitcher selected in the 2026 MLB Draft, racked up 12 strikeouts and allowed just two hits to improve his ERA to 1.03, good for the best in the nation. He was perfect through seven innings before allowing his first hit in the eighth.
“Everything felt good, you know,” Flora said to UCSB Athletics. “Today was probably my last start in this stadium, so I was trying not to think too much and go out there and compete, pitch with some emotion and fight for my guys, and it was really fun.
“Everybody kind of knew what was going on late in the game, and it does creep into your mind a little bit, but being able to take it one out at a time and flush good pitches and bad pitches and just move on to the next pitch was really important for me today.”
With Thursday’s standout performance, Flora secured his third career complete-game shutout. He is one of six Gaucho pitchers to accomplish this feat.
While Flora was mowing through Highlanders all night, UC Riverside’s Joshua Torres tossed all eight innings he could and was plenty effective himself. He allowed one run on three hits and five walks in the hard-luck loss.
The one run came in the bottom of the third inning when UCSB senior catcher Nate Vargas belted a solo home run over the right-field wall and off the scoreboard.
The Gauchos are now one step closer to a Big West regular-season championship, as a sweep would secure the title and send them into the conference tournament next week as the top seed.
UCSB and UC Riverside will meet for game two on Friday at 4:35 p.m. back at Caesar Uyesaka Stadium.